


look the part

by v3ilfire



Series: champagne pouring over us [1]
Category: Saints Row
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-21
Updated: 2016-11-21
Packaged: 2018-09-01 08:11:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8616328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/v3ilfire/pseuds/v3ilfire
Summary: “So why are we here again? I mean no offense, but I stopped hangin’ out at malls when I got my braces out.” “I was bored. And I wanna see what I can make of you.”“Of me?” Lucia said, muffled by soft pretzel. “The fuck is wrong with me?” “The first time we met, Johnny called and told me to look for a hoodie with legs. Is that what you want your look to be?”





	

**Author's Note:**

> welcome to the transformation of lucia valdez

Lin liked the new kid, honestly, though it was hard not to like a girl who snuck into Tony’s crib and carried Johnny Gat’s busted ass out during her second month with the Saints. Well, dragged, considering Lucia was only almost as tall and about a quarter as wide, but Aisha had appreciated it all the same. She was gutsy and always had this look about her, like she was keeping track of something that no one else saw. Not so much when she was headfirst in a fun bag, but hey, everyone needed a break sometimes.

  
“So how’s your double life going?” Lin shrugged, waiting for Lucia to turn her attention back to her burger so she could steal a fry.   
“Same shit, different day. I’ve got a couple of leads going, so you should have something to take back to Julius soon. He up your ass yet?”   
“Nah. Fucking up the VKs chilled him out. You’re good. And you’re welcome.”   
“He give you anything to do tonight?” Lucia shook her head, mouth too full of burger to even try to talk. Lin took the opening. “Good. I’m taking you out.”  
“Out as in a date or out as in dead? ‘Cause if I get a choice -- ”   
“Out as in there’s not exactly a lot of women running with the Saints or the Rollerz, and it’d be nice to spend more than ten seconds with someone whose jaw I don’t wanna fuckin’ break.”   
“Okay, ‘cause I was gonna say, I’m fuckin flattered and all, but you’re like _intimidating_ hot. The kind of date you deserve I’d have to start a piggy bank for.” Lin damn near choked on that french fry, but the coughing turned into laughter before Lucia had time to be concerned. “ _Ay_ , if you’re just trying to get me to do that CPR shit so you can make out with me, you could just ask.”  
“Thanks for the heads up.”

  
For a skinny kid Lucia could fuckin’ _eat_. They’d been at the mall twenty minutes before she caved and bought a thing of pretzel bites. Lin didn’t really know if she was more impressed or jealous that she could pack junk food away like that… mostly she was pissed that this was the third store that already had fall shit on display and it was only July. Fuckin’ Michigan.  
“So why are we here again? I mean no offense, but I stopped hangin’ out at malls when I got my braces out.”   
“I was bored. And I wanna see what I can make of you.”  
“Of me?” Lucia said, muffled by soft pretzel. “The fuck is wrong with _me_?”   
“The first time we met, Johnny called and told me to look for a hoodie with legs. Is that what you want your look to be?”   
“The look I want involves having tits and an ass. And those are fuckin’ _expensive_.”  
“Yeah, but a good pair of jeans will get you halfway there. It’ll be fun. And plus, the better you’re dressed, the less likely you are to be caught looking off-guard.” Lucia gave her a weird look, but didn’t say anything. Lin knew it would take some time for her to come around to the idea so she hadn’t married herself to it. The kid had potential to look sharp as fuck, enough so that Lin was kinda surprised Aisha hadn’t jumped on the idea first. She had long hair, good skin, was about 90% leg and the kind of bordering-unhealthy skinny that all her cousins aspired to.

  
And, well, it wouldn't hurt for her to look the part. Beaten up kid like that barely looked her age, let alone like a hardened Saint, and she’d need that. But as far as anyone was concerned trying to force someone who knew how to use a gun to do something against their will was a bad idea.   
“One rule,” Lucia said, the last pretzel bite on its way to her mouth. Maybe she was less resistant than Lin originally predicted.   
“What’s that?”  
“No skirts.” Fair enough, considering the amount of running and jumping they did to stay alive, and definitely one Lin usually stuck to herself.

  
Lucia ruled a few stores out right away: the ones that for some reason found it necessary to saturate the air and all their product with perfume, Let’s Pretend, and some new hippie pop-up that only used the itchiest hemp materials they could find. Once they got going though, Lin dove right into the challenge of dressing a pouting beanpole. She tried not to be too jarring with the things she picked out considering how fucking squirmy the kid was, so it was a lot of hoodie with legs plus. She started with more fitted sweatshirts and then pushed towards hoodies with mesh insets, mesh hoodies with fabric insets, a zip-up if she felt really daring, and a surprising amount of increasingly short shorts. Lucia was a bit resistant in the dressing room at first, but once she figured out that running around shooting shit for the last few months toned the shit out of her legs, she was more than happy to prance out into the hallway and strike poses in the tri-fold mirror.

  
Lin occupied a bench in a neighboring open stall. “See? I knew I could make a banger out of you.” She caught Lucia’s reflection sticking her tongue out at her.  
“ _Que se yo_?”   
“Exactly. And look, turns out you do have an ass.”  
“Great, now I just need the tits.” Lucia went back to her dressing room to change back into her own clothes, hesitant enough to give Lin gloating rights over the whole experience. “I got a question for you though.”  
“What’s up?”  
“How the fuck do you walk in heels?”

  
\---

  
Lucia’s apartment was a shithole by every standard, but she had made it plenty clear that she was not going anywhere until she could go _everywhere_ in pumps. Lin had, somehow and to her own amusement, created a fucking monster. “Come on. Heel, toe, heel, toe. You sure you shouldn’t have started a bit smaller?”

  
Lucia’s only motivation not to fall on her ass while she paced her living room on baby giraffe legs and six-inch heels was the fact that she was still holding a slice of pizza. “ _Cállate_. Go big or go home.” Lin shook her head. “And uh. Thanks, you know? For everything?”  
“It wasn’t any trouble. Saints won’t be any different from common street thugs if we don’t look out for one another.” Lucia gave her a weird look. “What?”  
“Nothing, just… never thought I’d make friends in a street gang, I guess.”   
“Hey, we’re still people. The Saints are pretty easy. Dex just wants someone bitch to, Johnny will go where there are guns and food in that order, and if you wanna chill with Aisha just go listen to music at her place or some shit. She’s a bomb-ass cook.Troy seems a bit jumpy, but that’s probably because he’s surrounded by a bunch of assholes.”   
“Hey!”   
Lin shrugged. “Nothing I wouldn’t say to their faces.”

  
Lucia rolled her eyes, but she had reached the end of her living room. She pivoted, took a breath, and started in the opposite direction again.   
“You didn’t say anything about me.”   
“Didn’t think I had to. Did you want to know what I think?”   
“Why not?”   
“You just wanna be respected.” Lucia kept taking her measured strides, but for a second her eyes got distant. “Heel-toe, Valdez. Keep it together.”

  
\---

  
“Alright Lin, why the fuck do I gotta do this?”   
Lin didn’t get a lot of opportunity to come down to the church anymore, and definitely not to hang out with the Saints in public, but she was starting to get attached to Lucia. She never realized how much she missed having female friends until she got one again. Lucia, busy swatching lipsticks on her arm, didn’t seem to be feeling quite so affectionate, but then again she never was. It was part of her charm.  
“I went through my makeup drawer and wanted to give you first pick.”  
“Why the fuck do you have so much shit?”  
“I used to do a lot of drunk online shopping.” Lucia snorted, but certainly didn’t complain and just popped the cap right off the next tube.  
“Ooh, I like this one.”

  
They’d taken up Johnny’s ‘office’ - his desk was the only one big enough for Lin to lay her shit out on and sit on top. Meanwhile Lucia held the compact in front of her face with the same concentration she had when she was sharpshooting, and painted her lips violet. “Well fuck me.”   
“See? I told you that you should branch out.” Lucia moved the tube to the ‘keep’ pile and reached for a wipe.   
“How the fuck am I supposed to pay you back for all this?”   
“You don’t have to --”   
“No, I mean for _all_ this,” she said, gesturing broadly to her entire ensemble. From the heels to the shorts to the fitted sweatshirt with the Saints’ fleur emblazoned on the side, she was Lin’s best project. Definitely come a long way from hoodie with legs, that was for sure. And Lin was … well, she was proud of her.  
“Just wear it well. Think of it as a welcome gift from me.”

  
Lucia smiled, reaching for a dark-colored tube next. “If only all gangs were this generous.”   
“Not all gangs are the Saints.” Lin watched as Lucia pursed her lips in response to the forest green color she twisted up. “I thought I could pull it off.”   
“... Right. Wanna get dinner?”

  
\---

  
_We’re gonna make it through this._

  
The blankets that Aisha dug up smelled like damp basement and the only thing they were really good for were sopping up the water that was dripping off Lucia’s shivering body. She thought being curled up in a little ball soaking wet in a church pew would be the worst part of it, but no, everyone whispering shit behind her fucking back took the actual cake. How’s Lucia? What happened? Is she crying? What now?

  
It was enough to make her wanna _scream_.

  
Before she could, Aisha sat down next to her. Lucia wasn’t looking but she knew it was Aisha because Johnny would have already offered to blow the Rollerz up (tempting) and Julius would try to be motivational (annoying). Aisha just… sat there. That’s all she wanted from anyone, really.  
“Hey,” she said finally. “You need anything?”  
Lucia’s laugh was cold. “Yeah. A hot shower and a rocket launcher.” She heard Dex snort from the back of the room.  
“You’ve been shot. We should get help.”  
“Nope.” Lucia shed the blankets right then and there - there would be absolutely no argument about this. Her shoulder was bandaged up and she was on just enough painkillers to be both reckless and still able to shoot straight. The bullet had only grazed her but apparently Sharp saw blood and called it good enough. His mistake.   
“Not until we get the Rollerz. I’m going to make them regret not putting a bullet in my fuckin forehead when they had the chance.”   
“See?” Johnny piped up from the back. “I told you she’s fine.”   
“You shut your damn mouth, Johnny Gat.”

  
Lucia used the distraction of their argument to hop over the back of the pew and head for the door before anyone could even think to stop her. She was wet, she was cold, she was angry, and she wanted to go home. She was shivering so hard by the time her bike screeched to a stop at the back of her building that finding her keys proved to be a challenge. Through sheer willpower she opened her door and nearly fell through, not sure if she was angry-crying or sad-crying but definitely still rooted in her need for a hot shower. As soon as she was able to get the water just hot enough to hurt, she curled up in the bottom of the tub and wrapped her arms around her knees.

  
Her first friend in Stilwater, dead. Lucia knew what she was getting into when she joined up with a fucking gang, but Jesus, that’s why she tried not to give too much of a shit about any of those assholes. Fuck, Lin not only made herself a friend, but a mentor. Even that motherfucker Donnie got attached enough to call her his girl. And now she was fucking gone. Only thing Lucia could do was pull her out of the water and call an ambulance.

  
Her cell phone drilled against the floor, just far enough away for her to have to drape herself over the tub and really fuckin reach for it. The day was really doing a number on her dignity.  
“ _Julius says you gotta get back here_.” Troy. Scared shitless, by the sounds of it.  
“What’s wrong?”   
“Rollerz are on their way. A whole fuckin lotta them.”   
“Gimme five.”

  
Maybe it was just an emotional time, or maybe the mixture of pain pills and adrenaline was fucking with her, but Lucia’s anger came back full force in that moment and pulled her from her self-made boiler and to her feet. There was no fucking time to wallow, never was. She had two minutes to get back to the church, three to make sure she looked good doing it, and the rest of the night to make a pack of rich-ass scumbags squeal into the night and regret the day they ever laid a finger on Lin.

  
‘Cause after all, not all gangs are the Saints. Lucia would have to kick Lin’s ass in the afterlife for telling her that.

  
She showed up to the church half a minute short of the Rollerz. Black and purple head to toe, six-inch heels, a bold-ass lip and a mean fucking snarl. Nobody looked at her like the sad, sopping pile of blankets they just saw half an hour beforehand, and that pushed all the nasty bullshit sitting on her chest far enough away for her to focus. Just in time, too; everyone turned their heads at the sound of screeching wheels.

  
And man, it could have been the light, but just before Julius handed her the beloved RPG, he even looked a little… nervous.

* * *

She was fucking fine with that.


End file.
